Employers who used Bank of Ireland to distribute the payments into staff, contractors and pension accounts for payment on Thursday were affected.

A spokeswoman from Bank of Ireland said there was not a “problem ” with the payments transfer but “the processing of the file was not completed”.

“The bank apologises profusely to those customers affected and wishes to reassure them that the credits will be in their account by first thing tomorrow morning,” she said. “This delay only affected one file and the majority of BOI payments were processed in a timely manner.”

She said the file was being processed last night and payments would reach all accounts by 10am today.

She would not confirm how many people had been affected by the error.

Tom Geraghty, general secretary of the Public Service Executive Union, told The Irish Times he estimated more than 100,000 people were affected by the error.

Worried

Mr Geraghty said people were very worried ahead of the long weekend their money would not arrive into their accounts on time.

“Some people could not buy groceries. I’m not exaggerating. Many of these people have already taken two to three pay cuts already,” he said.

He said civil servant pensioners found the delay particularly difficult. “Many live on a week to week existence.”

A teacher, who did not want to be named, said many people were left in a “desperate” situation with bills, mortgage payments, car loan and health insurance payments being taken from their accounts.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Education said salaries for primary teachers, special needs assistants and other non-teaching staff had not been paid.

She said pensions that were also due for retired teachers were also not transferred.

Bank of Ireland, AIB, Ulster Bank and Permanent TSB have confirmed they would waive any charges relating to the error.

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